Tuesday, March 18, 2014

Bound for Tamriel

No I am not dead - far from it actually.

I hate blogs that complain and I have not had much lately that didn't deserve some complaining so I have been keeping my mouth shut and head down.  I have roamed around middle earth a bit here and there and played with my warg -Lulu - quite a bit but like any game of fetch, fighting in the Moors was becoming the same every day.  Take a keep, lose a keep, take an outpost, lose an outpost, gank some poor newbie rune keeper ...  you get the idea.  So I have been mining some asteroids and investigating various other worlds run by other Gods in other dimensions.

I have been playing an active role in Middle Earth now for something over five years.  For all of this time I have given my yearly donations to the God's as a most devoted servant.  Yet despite my steadfast faith, I continue to feel their lack of attention.  My suspicious were confirmed recently with the violent removal of half the LOTRO Gods and the "reallocation" of a significant portion of those remaining.  The Gods overlooking Middle Earth are very few these days which tells me more than anything else what the world of LOTRO has ahead of it.  It is time for this Awesome Champ to move on.

Some of my wanderings have taken me back to Skyrim in Tamriel.  I love the place but it feels so lonely all the time.  I do great deeds but there is no one to sing my praises which makes it all feel rather... pointless.  I have continued with my training and I have been a crafting fool and killed lots and lots of dragons but being on my own all the time eventually left me with an empty feeling. Until that is, I began assisting with the creation of a new world based on the Elder Scrolls lore.

So I have been exploring Tamriel (The Elder Scrolls Online Beta Test)  and all I can say is...

"WOW!".

 I am super excited about the upcoming world creation mega event.  It isn't perfect but it is much closer to perfection than I have seen in a long time.  Where LOTRO was becoming boring and easy and hopelessly unbalanced, I have found The Elder Scrolls Online (TESO) to be extremely challenging, broad in scope, and a huge step forward.  (When a mob is a level higher than you be concerned...)

I will say up front, that one thing LOTRO has going for it is a great social atmosphere.  Singing, dancing, movie making, is still something that LOTRO excels at.  For everything else however, TESO is eons ahead. 

First, you are never constrained into a few narrow career paths.  You have given a few broad choices and tons of room to find your special niche,  Your career is far FAR less restrictive than LOTRO and finding your true calling is a great joy of TESO.

Most know I love crafting all sorts of things and TESO has a far more sophisticated system that makes real sense and is not detailed orientated just to keep you busy.  Just like your primary career, you are not restricted to a single crafting specialty either. You can follow any crafting profession and make anything given the enough experience and effort.  The one caveat is that your hard won experience can be applied to anything equally.  If you chose to train on armor making you are choosing not to train to fight with two handed weapons for example.  You can't have both, you have to chose how to use your time and energies.  Being as  addicted to making things as I am, this is going to be my biggest challenge.

I love the lore of Middle Earth and while the lore of TESO is quite deep I am really only just learning about it.  I am not sure it will ever match Middle Earth in that regard but on a positive note, my old friend, Brother Tom, a dude that likes to keep people healthy while wearing heavy plate steel and bashing baddies with a hammer has promised to join me.  He could never come to Middle Earth, despite my requests because he could never get over the fact that a person that heals in Middle Earth does so by playing a LUTE.

...

Frankly, I always thought that was some sort of joke as well but a joke that I had to look past in order to achieve my high levels of greatness.  The only guy I can think of that could kill with his music was Aegthil of Gondor but I suspect his pink hawtpants had as much to do with that as his lack of musical talent.  Ah well,

Anyway, I expect Tom to be part of my daily life soon which I am looking forward to.

Personally, I have learned a great deal from my friendship with Ruset the burglar.  (no he will not be coming with me. There is no place for hobbits in Tamriel ) and I have chafed at my inability to infuse my awesome damage output with some finesse skills such as LOTRO burglars possess.  TESO does not have those types of restrictions however so I will no longer feel held back from the true greatness that is me and what I can really become.  I expect the new me to be both awesome and crafty.  I might even learn to use a bow and arrow for more than just reaching out and inviting orcs to approach me.

So, while I am sad to leave LOTRO and all my LOTRO friends behind (Morageth the tanking Lore Master has agreed to join me - WIN!) I am so looking forward to being challenged again and to lose some of the silly restrictions the LOTRO Gods have placed around me. Living in world  that encourages its natives to ever greater deeds rather than fleecing them with empty promises like sheep will be my greatest reward.

If I can entice you to give TESO a try I will be happy and I look forward to seeing you here in Tamriel with me.  If not well...  I will see you at a concert sometime.

When you get to the last page...

Open a new book!

All the best my adoring fans.

-Andu